The present invention is directed to an aluminum electrolyte capacitor that is composed of two layers of aluminum foil wound with one another. The anode foil thereof is provided with an oxide layer that acts as a dielectric, and spacers are arranged between the foils and are saturated with a liquid operating electrolyte that contains combustible constituents. The aluminum electrolyte capacitor is integrated in a housing and an absorbent mass that bonds the electrolyte emerging from the winding is contained in the housing.
When electrolyte capacitors are used that include an operating electrolyte containing combustible constituents in areas in which there is a risk of fire and explosion, for example in mining, ther is a danger. These combustible constituents can include, for example, ethyleneglycol, and free electrolytes cannot be excluded even though they may only be present in limited quantities at times. For this reason, such electrolyte capacitors have previously not been capable of being utilized in such environments.
Given tantalum electrolyte capacitors that comprise a liquid operating electrolyte of sulfuric acid, DE-AS 11 08 810 discloses that this capacitor be integrated in an external housing and the interspace between the inner and outer housing are completely filled out with an absorbent mass. The absorbent mass contains additives that react with the electrolyte to form neutrally reacting substances without the formation of gas. What this is thereby intended to avoid is that the "non-combustible" sulfuric acid escapes into the environment when the inner housing loses its seal, for whatever reasons.
Because these capacitors contain a relatively great quantity of liquid operating electrolyte, it is necessary to fill the entire empty volume between the inner an outer housing with the absorbent mass. It is further necessary to provide an adequately large empty volume. Accordingly, these capacitors are therefore significantly large than they typically wound be based on the electrical values, so that the volume capacitance is considerably reduced. Moreover, due to the large empty volume that must be filled with the absorbent mass, the manufacturing costs of these capacitors is more expensive.